


Bargain For One Man

by jurawks



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Clint Barton Needs a Hug, Clintasha - Freeform, Deaf Clint Barton, F/M, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Natasha Romanov Has Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 16:48:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14024484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jurawks/pseuds/jurawks
Summary: [Post Avengers 1] They’d drank more beers than Natasha cared to count. Barton was barely speaking English, but he’d gotten her to read something to him in Russian. So she read him 'Anna Karenina'. He made sounds in all the right places although Natasha was pretty sure he didn’t understand ninety percent of it. They’d gotten through page four when Barton asked the damned question.





	Bargain For One Man

**Author's Note:**

> I ship Clintasha. The first draft of this was written way before Avengers 2 came out. I just took it out of storage and dusted it a little. :)

_“Your world in the balance and you bargain for one man?” Loki asks, amused._

 ---

It’s Sunday and the world hasn’t gone to shit. Natasha likes days like these. _Loves_ them. She likes days when she and Barton get to spend Sundays watching _Dog Cops_ and drinking beer, or taking Lucky for a walk to get pizza, or watch people and make up stories about them in industrialist cafes frequented by young white people with dreadlocks.

Sunday nights are the best. She gets to curl up with Barton under the covers and read. The first time they did that, he didn’t have a bedside lamp. He’d groaned and gotten out of the warm, warm bed and grumbled his way to the kitchen cabinet, grunting and rummaging until he found a torchlight. Natasha bought him a bedside lamp after that.

Tonight, they’d drank more beers than Natasha cared to count. Barton was barely speaking English, but he’d gotten her to read something to him in Russian. So she read him _Anna Karenina_. He made sounds in all the right places although Natasha was pretty sure he didn’t understand ninety percent of it. They’d gotten through page four when Barton asked the damned question. 

“What Loki said,” he began.

 _Aw shit_ , Natasha thought. Loki was two and a half weeks ago.

“What Loki said,” Barton tried again, “With the world in the balance, would you have bargained for me?”  

“You know what I said,” Natasha said smoothly.

“Tell me again,” he replied. For all his hazy drunkenness, his gaze was steady.  

“I said that I had red in my ledger, I’d like to wipe it out.”

He smiled and wiggled a finger at her, “That’s what you said. But that’s not what you did.”

No,” she smiled back, “I hit you really hard on the head.”

“Still not answering the question.”

Natasha sighed. Sometimes she liked Barton when he was drunk but most of the time, he was an ass. He wouldn’t remember what they spoke about anyway. No, that wasn’t true. Barton had the uncanny knack to remember things people did not want him to remember, and to forget things people _did_ want him to remember.

“Come on, Barton. You know that no single agent is that important,” she said, flipping the pages of _Anna Karenina_ idly.

Barton pulled out his hearing aids and stored them in the casing on the bedside table. Natasha sleeping over meant she’d wake him in the event of an emergency. Also, he could claim deafness if SHIELD tried to call him in early the next morning.

He lay on his side, facing Natasha.

"For the record,” he murmured, his hearing shot, “I would, you know.”

“Would what?” she asked, keeping her lips in his line of sight.  

“Bargain for you.”

She held his gaze for a moment, and another moment more until he closed his eyes. She stared at the yellowing book in her hands, carelessly smoothing out the dog ears of the pages. It took her too long to find the courage to say the words.

“ _You already have._ ”


End file.
